God's Irishmen: Theological Debates in Cromwellian Ireland (Oxford Studies in Historical Theology)

297 Pages·2007·2.09 MB·English

by  Crawford Gribben

God’s Irishmen
OXFORDSTUDIESINHISTORICAL THEOLOGY
SeriesEditor
DavidC.Steinmetz,DukeUniversity
EditorialBoard
IrenaBackus,Universite´ deGene`ve
RobertC.Gregg,StanfordUniversity
GeorgeM.Marsden,UniversityofNotreDame
WayneA.Meeks,YaleUniversity
GerhardSauter,RheinischeFriedrich-Wilhelms-Universita¨tBonn
SusanE.Schreiner,UniversityofChicago
JohnVanEngen,UniversityofNotreDame
GeoffreyWainwright,DukeUniversity
RobertL.Wilken,UniversityofVirginia
THECONFESSIONALIZATIONOF AFTERCALVIN
HUMANISMINREFORMATION StudiesintheDevelopmentof
GERMANY aTheologicalTradition
ErikaRummell RichardA.Muller
THEPLEASUREOFDISCERNMENT THEPOVERTYOFRICHES
MargueritedeNavarreasTheologian St.FrancisofAssisiReconsidered
CarolThysell KennethBaxterWolf
REFORMATIONREADINGSOF REFORMINGMARY
THEAPOCALYPSE ChangingImagesoftheVirginMaryin
Geneva,Zurich,andWittenberg LutheranSermonsoftheSixteenthCentury
IrenaBackus BethKreitzer
WRITINGTHEWRONGS TEACHINGTHEREFORMATION
WomenoftheOldTestamentamongBiblical MinistersandTheirMessageinBasel,
CommentatorsfromPhilothrough 1529–1629
theReformation AmyNelsonBurnett
JohnL.Thompson
GREGORYOFNAZIANZUSON
THEHUNGRYAREDYING THETRINITYANDTHEKNOWLEDGE
BeggarsandBishopsinRomanCappadocia OFGOD
SusanR.Holman InYourLightWeSeeLight
GregoryA.Beeley
RESCUEFORTHEDEAD
ThePosthumousSalvationof GOD’SIRISHMEN
Non-ChristiansinEarlyChristianity TheologicalDebatesinCromwellianIreland
JeffreyA.Trumbower CrawfordGribben
God’s Irishmen
Theological Debates
in Cromwellian Ireland
crawford gribben
1
2007
3
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LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Gribben,Crawford.
God’sIrishmen:theologicaldebatesinCromwellianIreland/
CrawfordGribben.
p. cm.—(Oxfordstudiesinhistoricaltheology)
Includesbibliographicalreferences.
ISBN978-0-19-532531-7
1. Protestantchurches—Ireland—History—17thcentury.
2. Churchcontroversies—Ireland—History—17thcentury.
3. Dissenters,Religious—Ireland—History—17thcentury.
4. Ireland—Churchhistory—17thcentury. I. Title.
BX4839.G752007
280'.40941509032—dc22 2006038508
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
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Preface
ThisbookmarksareturntoatheologicalenvironmentIfirstdescribed
inThepuritan millennium: Literature and theology, 1550–1682.The
worldofJohn Rogers—radical preacher, republican, and emerging
FifthMonarchist—hasbeen an intriguingbackground to anumber
of projects I have completed since my work onthe seventeenth cen-
tury began.1 Rogershas attractedother writers, though they tend
not to discusshis importance in the context of Cromwellian Ireland.
This book is therefore an attemptto contextualize some of the con-
clusionsthathavebeenofferedbycolleaguesinliterarystudies,whose
interest in Rogers’s conversion narratives hasnot always been sensi-
tive to the wider theological debates ofthe period, andto challenge
some ofthe conclusions of historians, who have explored that con-
text but tend sometimes to downplay the intensely fissiparous envi-
ronment of the cultures ofCromwellianIreland.2With allother
scholars of the period,I record my debtto indispensable work by
Toby Barnard, not least his seminal CromwellianIreland (1975),and
totwooldertextswhosecontributiongoesfarbeyondtheaccessthey
provide to documents destroyed in 1922: Robert Dunlop’s Ireland
under the Commonwealth (1913) andSt.John D. Seymour’s The Puri-
tans in Ireland, 1647–1661(1921). Unless otherwise noted, alltexts
listedin the bibliography have been published in London.
Mostoftheresearchforthisbookwascarriedoutduring
myappointmentasresearchfellowintheCentreforIrish-Scottish
Studies, Trinity College, Dublin. My four years in the Centre were
viii preface
formative, and my writing benefited immensely from the atmosphere of in-
tellectual curiosity and generosity I shared with such colleagues as Michael
Brown, David Dickson, Jane Ohlmeyer, and Ian Campbell Ross. The project
also profited from my discussions with other colleagues in Dublin,including
Robert Armstrong, Elizabethanne Boran, Raymond Gillespie, Sandra Hynes,
Amanda Piesse, and, more recently, Mark Sweetnam. In Belfast, Stephen
Gregory, librarian of Union Theological College, and James Davison, libra-
rianoftheIrishBaptistCollege,providedaccesstorarevolumes,aswellasother
opportunities for the gathering of ideas. Since moving to the University of
Manchester, I have been particularly grateful for the support of a coterie of
scholarsofthemid-seventeenthcentury,particularlyNaomiBakerandJerome
de Groot, and have also gained immense help from conversations with Joe
Bergin,JeremyGregory,JohnMcAuliffe,JackiePearson,andMurrayPittock.
In the wider scholarly community, I am particularly grateful for advice pro-
vided by Toby Barnard, Sylvia Brown, Ian Clary, John Coffey, Tim Cooper,
David Farr, Alan Ford, Andrew Holmes, Kathleen Lynch, Simon Meeds,
GarnetMilne,MikeRenihan,andDavidShedden.Somematerialsinchapters
2and3appearedpreviouslyinChurchHistoryandinthevolumeConvertsand
conversion in Ireland, 1650–1850 (2005), and I am grateful to the editors of
thesepublicationsfortheirpermissiontoreusethismaterial.WillyMaley,just
before he took to the stage to deliver the University of Manchester’s John
Stachniewski Memorial Lecture in April 2006, suggested the title for this
book, which pays homage to definitive work by Christopher Hill, in God’s
Englishman: Oliver Cromwell and the English revolution, and Hilary Hinds, in
God’s Englishwomen: Seventeenth-century radical sectarian writing and feminist
criticism. God’s Irishmen shares many of the interests of these colleagues and
friends. I alone, of course, should be held responsible for the errors that will
inevitably remain.
In many ways this book is the product of a digital revolution. Both the
University of Manchester and Trinity College, Dublin, provided access to the
Early English Books Online (EEBO) database, without which a range of ma-
terials of the 1650s could not easily have been collected. Though EEBO is a
necessary resource, it is not sufficient, and this project could not have been
completed without the additional assistance of staff at the Public Record Of-
fice of Northern Ireland, Belfast; the Special Collections unit at Queen’s
University of Belfast; the National Library of Ireland, Dublin; Trinity College
Library, Dublin; Archbishop Narcissus Marsh’s Library, Dublin; the John Ry-
lands University Library, Manchester; Chetham’s Library, Manchester; the li-
braryofWestminsterCollege,Cambridge;theUniversityLibrary,Cambridge;
preface ix
the Bodleian Library, Oxford; and the British Library, London. I record my
debt to Cynthia Read, my editor at Oxford University Press, who has pa-
tiently supported this project at every stage of its development. Most of all,
I record my gratitude to my mother and father, to Pauline and to Daniel.
Moladh go deo leis.